442 or 4231.

[flying high up in the sky! 1]

Vote for what you would go for. For me am happy with 4231 works well with the players we have.

[Olly 0]

We look a much better team playing 4-2-3-1 under Hughton, and now we have the quality to score goals in that formation too I think

[Redders Right Foot 22]

with players who are now more suited to it, 4-2-3-1. unlike last season we can now use it in a more attacking sense. with snodds and redmond on the wing, we have both good delivery and pace, and both can have a nice crack at goal (redmond more so from what we''ve seen so far.) Howson seems to be coming into his own, ready to cement his place in midfield. and with Fer we have someone to get the ball forward, either with a pass or just brushing the opposition aside while going forward, however he is also very more than capable of defending when needed.

[iron_stan 0]

we have the players to play bothhughton wont play anything other than 1 up front, just like it was for 98% of last seasonjust because they switched to 2 strikers in the 2nd half against braga and it didnt go well people are blabbering and jumping to conclusions on here about how it doesnt work, ignoring the fact braga played a weak team first half and then changed it up along with norwich making a load of changes, it jsut doesnt mean isht

truth is lots of people wanted 2 up front last season, and are even more interested now to see how hooper and wolfswinkel might do together

[mrs miggins 0]

i think with the players that we have now, I believe 4-4-2 would be the best option (hooper for wes).I guess people are going with the 4-2-3-1 formation because it didn''t really work due to us not having a good enough 2nd striker better than wes.

I think what will probably happen is that Hughton will start with the 4-2-3-1 formation and then go to a 4-4-2 once we start finding our feet as he''s known to be a 4-4-2 manager before he came here.

[robinhodson 0]

I''m afraid you are right. Hughton must be congratulated for the players he has brought in. What is the point however if you are only going to play one up front. My only hope is that it backfires I him and the board realise they need to get someone more adventurous and imaginative in. And the season hasn''t even started yet lol

[mrs miggins 0]

why put a ''lol'' at the end?

[Alan_Grey 0]

Because he read what he wrote and could only laugh.

[Redders Right Foot 22]

getting rid of hughton before the season has begun?

just because your team has lost their first game of the season followed up by losing to a league one team, doesn''t give you a credible excuse to post here.

[Lavanche 0]

Hughton really isnt 4-4-2 manager as some of you state. He even have critisized that formation style a bit in his Newcastle times.

I hope we got for 4-2-3-1 or other variations where we use 3 at middle of the park. Last season 4-4-2 not working didnt have anything to do with quality of players, but their style of game and not only strikers, but middlefielders too.

And I see neither of Hooper or RvW playing at the pocket. Some of you say now, that Hooper has stated he can do it and he had Samaras as a target man in Celtic, but Samaras is quite different player than RvW is and they played completely different league as there is so much more room and if you have deeper middlefielder to make your plays, you dont need to have that creator in pocket.

So I dont see Hooper and RvW being many times in same starting lineup and us to go for 4-2-3-1. Ofc there is still time in transfer market, but with current squad lonely striker is kind a only option week after week, if we want to keep our players fresh.

[Highland Canary 76]

I don''t think any of you who advocate 4-2-3-1 will be disappointed, at least with the formation employed that is.

[ReadingCanary 0]

4 4 2 is the most outdated formation in the world.I don''t understand why people are fascinated with having 2 strikers up front2 strikers doesn''t mean more goals.It''s all about the midfield and supplyGlad we won''t be going anywhere near 4 4 2 this season.

[Yellowfuture 71]

It''s an infatuation with some posters, the formation last night with the personnel we have was spot on, 442 belongs to Sunday football.

[AJ 1,218]

Fer is going to be an immense change in system to Hoolahoop. In the games last season where we pressed forward we played some good football and scored some good goals.

What we need is to not get sucked into defending deep which happened a lot last season, and as a result stopped us scoring goals. Bringing in players like Fer, and RvW bring in some experience and a change of dynamic, Redmond and Olsson add youth and bags of pass down the flanks too.

We will line up with 4-2-3-1 on most occasions I would imagine, with this seemingly Hughton''s favored formation for the Prem. It kept us up last year, and with our new recruits should do better than last year.

It does make me wonder where Hooper fits in though, or him and RvW literally gunning for a starting place?

[Indy_Bones 441]

[quote user="ReadingCanary"]4 4 2 is the most outdated formation in the world.[/quote]Surely that would be the 2-3-5 formation from the early days of pro football...All you need to do is play round with numbers and you apparently play a completely different way!What''s the difference between 4-4-2 and 4-4-1-1? Simple, one of the two strikers is more withdrawn, but you''ve still basically got a 4-4-2.There''s also a big difference between a flat 4-4-2, a diamond 4-4-2, an attacking 4-4-2, and you can even interpret things like 4-2-2-2 as being a 4-4-2 if you want.Instead of focusing on labels and blindly proclaiming ''oudated'', you need to justify exactly how and why the tactic shouldn''t be used, and whilst I''ll fully agree that the stereotypical 4-4-2 that we saw through the later 80''s and early 90''s is now likely to struggle against most opposition, it all comes down to HOW the tactic is used and if you have the players to make it work as intended.As I''ve said on another thread, the 4-4-2 used by Milan under Sacchi could still work now if you have the right players and training (but probably isn''t sustainable for more than 2 seasons unless you have a big squad full of top players), as it was based on pressing, possession and attacking (much like Spain and Barca are now, but Milan had less focus on endless passing en-route to goal and were more direct), so to dismiss a formation simply because it''s 4-4-2 is illogical, it''s what TYPE of 4-4-2 and HOW it''s being implemented that matters.

[Faded Jaded Semi Plastic SOB 1,020]

I know last night was only a friendly, but at times I thouight our lone striker looked isolated, I am hoping that when there are points at stake our midfield will support the lone strike a lot quicker......

[BOO 0]

That did happen SOB but only rarely IMO, I thought Fer supported VW very well, and also Redman got forward a lot and could have played VW in a bit more than he did, when he learns to release the ball at the right time he is going add another dimension to us going forward.

[CambridgeCanary 0]

Fer was rarely more than 20yards from Ricky and was always looking to play him in. He won a lot of headers with flick ons

When Fer moved back and Howson and Wes became the AM, that discipline was not maintained and Ricky was isolated as was Hoops